The present invention relates to a towing assembly, and more particularly to a hitch structure mountable to a three point harness of a tractor which cooperatively engages a tongue adaptor securable to towable apparatus such as farm equipment and the like such that a tractor operator can quickly, easily and effortlessly couple and especially de-couple towable apparatus while remaining seated on the tractor.
The collection of hay from the field has always been a time consuming yet necessary task for farmers. Once cut, dried, raked and baled, the hay is left for pick-up, collection, transport and ultimately storage. As the bales are typically scattered throughout a field or a number of fields, a great deal of time is generally spent in route, whether it be travelling from one bale area to another for collection, or in back and forth travelling associated with retrieval of the bales as in pick-up and loading once in a bale area.
Heretofore, a loading tractor for bale pick-up and a hauling tractor and trailer combination were essential to bring the hay in for storage. Generally, the separate tractors, one having a trailer in tow, head out together for hay bale collection. Once a bale area has been reached, the hauling tractor centrally parks itself for receipt of the bales loaded by the loading tractor. The loading tractor, typically equipped with a bale skewer attachment or equivalent structure for running through the bales, retrieves the bales and transfers them to the trailer of the hauling tractor and trailer combination.
The hauling tractor""s sole function is to follow the loading tractor Pied Piper like, carrying the collected bales from one bale area to another. Once in a bale area, the hauling tractor, and the tractor operator, sit idle. As one might suspect, a great deal of idle time is inherent in such operation. Not only is there a direct xe2x80x9ccostxe2x80x9d associated with the idle time for both the operator and equipment, one ultimately reflected in the xe2x80x9cprice,xe2x80x9d there exists lost opportunity costs, namely the work otherwise completed but for the availability of the operator and equipment, which are greatly underutilized in the heretofore known approaches to bringing in the hay from the fields.
The present invention provides a supremely efficient versatile approach to hay bale collection and transport, namely one that eliminates the need for separate tractors for bale pick-up and collected bale hauling. The facile tractor hook-up of the present invention includes a frame adapted to be received on a vertically moveable three point harness of a tractor. A hitching hook having a body, a loop engaging portion, and a spring tensioned keeper pivotally secured at one end to the body, is carried by the frame. The loop engaging portion has a hook shaped tip defining a loop receiving slot. The keeper has an open position allowing access to the loop receiving slot and a closed position extending to the hook shaped tip to close the loop receiving slot. A keeper actuator for remotely actuating the spring tensioned pivoting keeper between the closed and the open positions is provided. A tongue adaptor, securable to towable apparatus, is further provided and includes an elongated tongue blade having a looped end portion for receipt by the loop engaging portion of the hitching hook, and capture therein by the spring tensioned pivoting keeper. More specific features and advantages will become apparent with reference to the DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION, appended claims, and the accompanying drawing figures.